NHS Fat Cats 4

Maria Fort Better Government

Today, the Telegraph reported on an issue that the TPA has covered frequently, government fat cats that make entirely too much money. Figures show that high level executives for the various NHS Trusts saw spending on their collective salaries go up about 38% in the past year. Some individuals saw pay increases of a “meagre” 7% while others saw 17-20% increases. Those pay increases came after NHS execs backed a 2% rise for nurses’ pay, despite the fact that the NHS pay review board suggested a 2.5% hike.

Let’s put this into real numbers, shall we? High level execs saw their salaries and benefits packages increase as much as £20,000, the entire starting salary of a registered nurse BEFORE taxes. The same nurses running around the hospitals while NHS executives are sitting in plush offices using their extensive benefits packages to shove more money into their retirement funds than the nurses will see in a lifetime. Hardly seems fair does it? It isn’t. So with an ever-growing government and an increasing list of careless mistakes and failures, just think of how many more people per year are earning taxpayer-funded bonuses the size of your annual salary.

Pretty soon, and for the third year in a row, the TaxPayers’ Alliance will release a paper showing the total remuneration of the lucky few who work in high profile public sector jobs. As in years past, we will show that average increases in salary, bonuses, benefits and pension contributions awarded in public sector jobs far exceed those of their private sector counterparts. We will highlight items such as the plumpest payouts and bonuses for blunders. Finally, we will show that while the private sector will tighten their belts in the recession, public sector officials can carelessly over-regulate and relax as their pay checks will get them through just fine. Stay tuned for the release of this year’s “Public Sector Rich List,” and to see previous versions, see our publications page.

Maria Fort

Maria is a graduate of the London School of Economics and Political Science, where she completed her Master’s degree in Politics and Government in the European Union. She also holds a bachelor’s degree in International Affairs and Economics from James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

Follow @fortml

mr angry

At last NHS managers pay isbeing highlighted. However there is one point that needs to be corrected. apparently the TORIES are blaming Labour for the rises that managers are awarding themselves. Here is a little history lesson:- trusts were formed under the last government,(circa 1990) these were sold to the employees as being beneficial as trusts could set their own pay scales, in reality managers awarded themselves huge salaries while the workers were held to whatever the government allowed
john graham

Whether or not Mr Angry is correct about the Tories I do not know. He has however brilliantly highlighted a core issue with the entire public sector, ie that you have public sector people setting awards of taxpayers money to other public sector people and eventually blaming yet more public sector people for the issue but still going ahead anyway…. ( no doubt adding in more public sector people to deliver a report or twenty on it…) – this is clearly happening right now on a massive scale. The man is clearly correct as well as angry..
john graham

Whether or not Mr Angry is correct about the Tories I do not know. He has however brilliantly highlighted a core issue with the entire public sector, ie that you have public sector people setting awards of taxpayers money to other public sector people and eventually blaming yet more public sector people for the issue but still going ahead anyway…. ( no doubt adding in more public sector people to deliver a report or twenty on it…) – this is clearly happening right now on a massive scale. The man is clearly correct as well as angry..
John

As someone who works in the public sector, the amount of service provided by or work delivered by a public sector employee is almost in inverse proportion to their pay packet.
Our chief executive publishes a banal diary of her doings every month, finds time to produce a podcast that is beyond satire, and attends monthly Strategic Management meetings where they ponder on important topics such as parking for councillors, listen to ever more tedious presentations on equal opportunities and call for controls on students playing football on the grass in the front of the guildhall.
Of coruse, she was a radical when she arrived and she launched a restructuring programme called ‘Ymlaen:Making Change Deliver’ but it mainly focused on negotiating the early retirement of chief officers and giving the surviving ones new job titles. Eventually she stopped publishing the tedious Ymlaen Newsletters, because well, there was nothing to report.
I am sure this can’t be typical of all top public sector management, but who knows, she was headhunted for the job! You can’t just give a hundred grand job to people with enough gumption to apply themselves, they have to be invited to apply.